Synopses & Reviews
If any one thing, Brilliant Orange is about Dutch space and a people whose unique conception of it has led to ome of the most enduring art, the weirdest architecture, and a bizarrely crebral form of soccer--Total Football--that led in 1974 to a World Cup finalsmatch with arch-rival Germany and more recently to a devastating loss againstSpain in 2010. With its intricacy and oddity, it continues to mystify and delght observers around the world. As David Winner wryly observes, it is an expression of the Dutch psyche that has a shaed ancestry with the Mondrian's Broadway Boogie Woogie, Rembrandt's Th Night Watch, maybe even with Gouda cheese. Finally here in paperbck, Brilliant Orange reaches out to the reader from an unexpected place andnever lets go.
Review
"[An] articulate analysis of Dutch football culture - ESPN
"the definitive guide [to Dutch soccor]" -- Slatebr
"One of the definitive books of the game." -- The Times (Lonon)
"One of those strangely informative books that will... entertin those who have little interest in eithersoccer or the Netherlands." -- The Economist
"This extremel well written and exciting book, like Nick Hornby's immensely enjoyable , catches us up in its enthusiasm and puts us right there inthe grandstands cheering for the Dutch coaches and players who changed thegame of soccer forever." -- Booklist (starred review)
"Wry,obsessional, digressive, deep...this is football as art, metaphor, cutural signifier." -- The Guardian
Synopsis
Winner's book chronicles how the Dutch revolutionized soccer in the 1960s by implementing a technique based on position-switching: defenders would suddenly become attackers and vice versa, thus substantially reducing the amount of repetitive back-and-forth running.
Synopsis
Brilliant range is a book about Dutch soccer that's not really about Dutch socer. It's more about an enigmatic way of thinking peculiar to a people whose landscape is unrelentingly flat, mostly below sea level, ad who owe their salvation to a boy who plugged a fractured dike with his little inger.
About the Author
David Winner is the author of Brilliant Orange: The Neurotic Genius of Dutch Soccer, also published by Overlook.